Information from the Statistics and Census Service (DSEC) indicated that as at the end of September 2018, total number of licensed motor vehicles dropped by 1.2% year-on-year to 238,792, of which light motorcycles (26,626) decreased by 11.2% whereas heavy motorcycles (96,935) rose by 1.0%. New registration of motor vehicles in the third quarter fell by 25.8% year-on-year to 3,392. Meanwhile, new registration of motor vehicles in the first three quarters of 2018 went down by 8.0% year-on-year to 10,887, with heavy motorcycles (5,635) dropping by 20.9%.
There were 3,480 cases of traffic accidents in the third quarter of 2018 and number of victims totalled 1,041, down by 10.3% and 19.2% respectively year-on-year. In the first three quarters of 2018, number of traffic accidents decreased by 7.1% year-on-year to 10,297 cases, resulting in 3,225 casualties and 6 of them were killed.
Cross-border vehicular traffic grew marginally by 0.5% year-on-year to 1,216,562 in the third quarter of 2018. In the first three quarters of 2018, cross-border vehicular traffic rose by 1.5% to 3,639,563; vehicular traffic through the Checkpoint of Cotai (30.3% of total) increased by 16.4%, while that through the Border Gate (68.8%) dropped by 3.8%. Passenger ferry movements between Macao and Mainland China and between Macao and Hong Kong went down by 3.1% year-on-year to 32,618 trips in the third quarter, and movements in the first three quarters of 2018 fell by 5.1% to 99,109 trips.
Commercial flight movements at the Macau International Airport totalled 15,875 in the third quarter of 2018, up by 13.8% year-on-year. In the first three quarters of 2018, commercial flight movements increased by 13.4% year-on-year to 45,728, with those to and from Mainland China, Thailand and Taiwan growing by 19.7%, 18.5% and 1.5% respectively, whereas those to and from the Republic of Korea and Vietnam falling by 14.8% and 6.1% respectively. Helicopter flight movements between Macao and Mainland China and between Macao and Hong Kong went up by 8.8% year-on-year to 3,055 in the third quarter, and movements in the first three quarters of 2018 rose by 6.2% to 9,449.
In the third quarter of 2018, gross weight of containerized cargo by land grew by 21.1% year-on-year to 3,913 tonnes, and seaborne containerized cargo rose by 14.8% to 44,346 tonnes. Seaborne container throughput amounted to 34,635 TEU, equivalent to 23,697 containers handled, up by 7.4% and 4.6% respectively. In the first three quarters of 2018, gross weight of containerized cargo by land decreased by 3.6% year-on-year to 11,166 tonnes, of which cargo passing through the Checkpoint of Cotai (10,578 tonnes) accounted for 94.7%; gross weight of seaborne containerized cargo increased by 2.1% year-on-year to 124,870 tonnes, with 52.5% (65,567 tonnes) passing through the Inner Harbour. Seaborne container throughput rose by 6.9% year-on-year to 100,917 TEU in the first three quarters, equivalent to 68,889 containers handled, up by 4.6%.
The Macau International Airport handled 9,150 tonnes of air cargo in the third quarter of 2018, down slightly by 0.2% year-on-year. Air cargo increased by 6.0% year-on-year to 28,098 tonnes in the first three quarters of 2018, with inward cargo (5,159 tonnes) and outward cargo (17,874 tonnes) rising by 8.2% and 10.5% respectively. Meanwhile, transit cargo (5,065 tonnes) dropped by 9.0%.
As at the end of September 2018, number of fixed-line telephone subscribers decreased by 5.3% year-on-year to 126,401. Number of mobile phone subscribers rose by 11.4% to 2,307,628, with stored-value GSM card subscribers (1,534,778) taking up 66.5%. Number of internet subscribers increased by 7.7% year-on-year to 417,900. In the third quarter of 2018, the cumulative duration of internet usage edged down by 0.5% year-on-year to 311 million hours, and the duration of usage reached 928 million hours in the first three quarters of 2018, up marginally by 0.5%.